struggle against capital: profit and innovation versus values and norms

The choice maker that has been challenged the most throughout time and had to fight the hardest to survive is definitely the independent capital. Both in the Bible and the Koran as in most other religions (excluding Judaism and Protestantism) the strife for profit and grand capital are considered ‘a tool of the devil’ and best to be avoided. Let it then be a painful truth that the biggest fighter of usury and interest slavery, namely the Catholic church, has always been the richest religious institution of the world. Possible explanations for the traditionally negative comportment against capital are numerous and quite logical. Especially because the majority of the world’s population throughout time could not claim any capital and capital was after all in the hands of minorities who evidently protected their own interests. Moderating mechanisms such as the divine legitimacy of the medieval “stands” society and the cooperation of the classes have put stress on important nuances, in the end the capital has experienced the most severe opposition from both the state as the community and the now long dead church.

In our radical quest for emancipation we must consider such matters as the capital and related subjects. Inductively, we see that neither the state or society has managed to destroy and take over the role of the capital, as they have succeeded with for example the church, however they have been close. This struggle has actually turned out on a draw and the peace treaty of “liberal democracy and free-market economy” during the second half of the 20th century. Both the state and the capital can now be seen as social allies, joining forces to profit from each other and leech on the labor of the social subjects. Globalization, consumerism and mass consumption are the main effects of the liberal pact. In spite of their limited impact on society and the capital, the states – and especially the state conglomerates – are more powerful than they have ever been in history. The democratizing wave of the 20th century allowed the states to play a bigger role on the capitalist and meritocratic stage from a more latent and background position. Their cost to weigh on the world and the people and capital on it decreased heavily, but their weight increased dramatically. The fact that states around the world have often monopolies on a wide range of goods and services (police and military equipment, information databases) give them a certain market advantage. Liberalism is therefore the perfect medium for the state and interest groups to gain elaborate profits from the fruits of the free market for lower costs. We can state that the state doesn’t fight capital (anymore) and that both groups keep each other in power in the current liberal capitalist framework that is the globalized liberal world.

Society has more or less conciliated to consumerism and mass consumption. The majority of subjects in the West belongs after all to either the liberal or social democratic segment of the political spectrum. The liberals put stress on economic prosperity and the social-democrats emphasize social correction and improved living standards. Marginal phenomenon’s such as communism or solidarism in the West are exceptional and socially too negatively connotated that they have a hard time finding both the means and the people and the incentives to make a difference or even threaten capitalism in the long run.

However radicalism in its global perspective is an effect of economic downfall I think it is unlikely that capital and state will be driven away from power anywhere soon or in the near future. The cost and the risk of a revolution under current circumstances are too high and estimated not to be worth the effort in comparison to the contemporary status quo. But from the moment the world reaches the point of the Weimar days – and we are steadily going down this road – both the cost and benefit for a revolution will drop so radically and steep down that a social revolution will be perceived as inevitable and necessary. If we reach the point were people feel that they have nothing to lose, the current system is doomed and will disappear.

But just like the state and society we can not see the absolution of capital as self-evident. It’s not because she isn’t openly opposed that it necessarily is the absolute answer for society. It isn’t even necessarily so that capital is the absolute answer for society in its current form under the current circumstances. However, I don’t doubt that the free market and capitalism under present social parameters and – keeping in mind her benefits to society and the state – is the best possible solution to our present challenges. I don’t doubt and yet I do. But because I can’t give a better answer, and because there are no answers, I do not consider it a personal quest to come up with answers. But never the less I think that is my – and maybe also your – personal duty not only to think post-democratic and post-social, but also post-capitalistic and always strife to look for better answers. They might not be there; they’re probably not there, but thinking, questioning is the source, the root of human existence.

{Even though I’ll probably match the Libertarian political uniform – in the way that I plead for a radical review of governmental functions and funding – I consider myself a radical enemy of liberalism because I think that the human freedom is totally subordinated to the human will. I defend this idea on every aspect: social, economic, personal and artistic. In the present capitalist world economy the mantra of freedom is law and is to be interpreted vaguely. Interest slavery and usury are from a liberal point of view perfectly okay because they fit in a free-market system. But interest, usury and monopolies imply for me a fundamental unfreedom. The mantra of liberalism states that my freedom goes as far as where the freedom of my neighbor begins. But how can this justify what happens on the free market? People who live in debt are not free and people can not chose freely for a free-market economy. There are no alternatives. You are thrown into it and there is no free choice. How is this free? This threatens the rights of men, namely the voluntary rejection of personal rights. But yes, there is no such right. There is no such freedom. Well anticipated by the liberals though, because in the universal declaration of human rights, the Koran of the liberal dictatorship, that is impossible to reject or even question your own rights and liberties. Why is that? How is that ‘too far’? Why are we not free to be unfree? Do our freedom addicts fear the end of their reign of freedom? I bet they do. So we can conclude that we are far from free. We are no longer the slaves of God or Kings or States. We are the slaves of freedom. I wish not to think in terms of natural law and natural liberties or self-evidence. By rejecting this and the concepts of ‘voluntas’ and ‘libertas’ I can also easily dodge the label of libertinism. How can I worship God if I chose not to, whether he exists or not? How can I worship freedom if I don’t believe in it, whether I am or not? I even manage to dodge the label of anarchism, because I believe that ultimate freedom and radical absolution is a boiling point, but not a goal. Even worse, my hole quest for radical human emancipation is a flagrant lie, because I call upon absolute freedom to prove my point. A flagrant lie that is a lie because of its absolute character and content. My counter argument, wherein I state that the boiling point of absolution is not a goal, but that the ultimate free Enlightened individual is only then able to voluntarily submit himself to his chains of preference (love, society, capitalism,…), is therefore false. But maybe the value of radical emancipation lies not in its goal, the voluntary submission, but maybe in the strife to an absolution that does not exist. Therefore my manifesto has no meaning, no purpose, no goals to set and no dream to pursuit. Therefore this is not an ideology or a call for action, but a mere idea. A twisted idea full of contradictory concepts and no finality. An idea that has no beginning nor an end. An idea that is not even personal, but merely the result of imperfect human imagination. Therefore this idea is life itself and a celebration of the imperfect and fowl creature that is the derailed human being and his meaningless pity life. It is wrong, and therefore perfect.